YuGiOh!: Darkest Hour
by ViewtifulDarnell
Summary: The Annual Summer Tournament begins! Kyle duels against Tim, a duelist known for using Allies of Justice. Will he be the first of the gang to get knocked out of the tournament or will he be one step closer to the second round?
1. Prologue: Enter the Shadow Games

Duel Academy* Class of 2012

I'm following almost all of the regular TCG rules. One of the main notable changes is that cards that are normally included in the deck such as Ritual monsters and monsters that have very specific requirements for a special summon won't be included in the main deck, they'll be in the Extra Deck. I may also not use the "pay X00 life points" part of certain card effects. If I eventually end up making up cards they'll probably not be overpowered.

**Plot Synopsis**: In the year 2012, an evil underground cult harnesses a dark magic that they believe will allow them to summon an all powerful demon by sacrificing a large number of souls won in competitions. What better way to win souls than through Duel Monsters? Can anyone stop them or will the world fall victim to the wrath of an all-powerful devil?

Hopefully you like it. Read/Rate/Review please.

In an abandoned warehouse, on a dark and stormy night a scream echoes as lightning crashes and a body falls to the floor. Another man approaches the body and looks down on it in disgust, "Pathetic. These scrubs barely know how to duel. No matter, a soul's a soul." The man raised the hood to the black cloak he was wearing and left the other man in the warehouse.

*The next morning... across town...* "Weird..." Derek muttered as he read an internet news article about a police case that was currently under investigation. Derek was about 5'8 tall and skinny. He had dark red hair and brown eyes.

"What?" his friend, Kyle asked. Kyle was shorter, about 5'6 and was slightly muscular. He had black hair and green eyes.

"This. 6 people were found in comas recently. No sign of what did it but they all had one thing in common: They just finished a duel before the coma. Their duel disks were still on with 0 life points and all their cards were still out," Derek explained.

"Weird... You don't think-" Kyle was interrupted by the bell signaling that school was over. "You don't think they're related do you?" Kyle finally asked as they started to leave. "I mean,we duel all the time and we've never been put into a coma."

"I know. I was thinking maybe there's something bigger to it. I think whoever's dueling these guys is doing it. No idea how, but maybe it's possible," Derek suggested.

"Never know... speaking of which, we're supposed to meet everyone at the park today to get ready for that tournament that starts next week," Kyle reminded him.

"I just gotta stop home and get my deck first. Tell everyone I'll be there a few minutes late," he replied before the two split in separate directions.

When Derek got home he ran upstairs to his bedroom and grabbed his duel disk and deck from his desk, ignoring the package addressed to him that was also on the desk. Once he got to the park he saw that his friends had started without him. Kyle and 4 others: Ariana, Matt, Chloe, and Wade, were sitting at the playground discussing possible stradegies for the tournament.

"Thanks for waiting for me guys," Derek saaid as he joined his friends.

"We figured it didn't matter since _I'm_ winning the tournament anyway," Chloe answered smugly. She had shoulder length green hair and turquoise eyes. She was about 5'2 tall.

"You mean when you end up as runner up?" Wade corrected her. Wade had shaggy blue hair and eyes that matched. He was 6'0 and easily the tallest of the group.

"Good to know that everyone's modest..." Ariana muttered. She had golden blonde hair and blue eyes. She was 5'4. "How long is round 1 supposed to last?"

"Friday and Saturday," Matt answered. He had dark brown hair, midnight black eyes and was 5'7. "The final rounds are on Sunday I think."

The group spent the next two hours devising stradegies and making notes of deck edits they would need to make before the tournament and tested their decks against each other. Before they knew it, it was night.

"It's 8 already?" Ariana asked. "Ugh... I needa go home. I'll see you guys tomorrow. See you in school Wade." Wade and Ariana went to a different school than Kyle, Derek, Matt, and Chloe.

"I think we might as well all call it a day," Derek suggested. The grouped nodded in unison and started off.

"Crap!" Matt said when they reached the end of the park. "I left my jacket back there. I'll catch up with you guys tomorrow," he turned and head back into the park to get his jacket. When Matt approached the exit to the park again, this time with his jacket, a dark figure stepped out from the shadows.

"Greetings," the person stepped into the light and became more visible. He was wearing a black cloak that covered his face. He lowered it revealing dark eyes with heavy bags under them and a scar above his left eye. His hair was short and white and he wore a look of pure evil on his face. He wore a black duel disk, detailed with silver paint. "Care for a duel?"

"Ugh... I kinda have to go somewhere," Matt answered.

"It was a rhetorical question," the man said as he revealed a gun and pointed it at Matt.

Matt swallowed hard and struggled to reply, "Ugh... ugh... yeah... duel. Okay."

The man replaced his gun, took out his deck, shuffled it, and placed it in his duel disk before activating it. Matt shuffled his deck and activated his duel disk. As he drew his opening hand, Matt's hand shook feverishly. What did this man want? Why did he want to duel so badly? What would happen if he lost?

"I'll start," the man said. "I summon The Fabled Rubyruda(LV4 ATK 1100) in attack mode and set two cards face down to end this turn."

Matt drew Maurading Captain. He looked at the rest of his hand: Lightning Blade, Queen's Knight, The Warrior Returning Alive, Blast With Chain, and Silent Swordsman LV3. "I summon Maurading Captain(LV3 ATK 1200) and by summoning him I activate his effect, it allows me to summon another monster, like Silent Swordsman LV3(LV3 ATK 1000). Next I'll place one card face down and equip Lightning Blade to Maurading Captain raising his power to 2000. Attack!" Maurading Captain gripped the Lightning Blade and swung at Fabled Rubyruda but his attack was blocked somehow.

"I activate my monster's ability. By discarding another 'Fabled' monster, like my Fabled Grimro, I can negate your attack," the man(Zane) explained.

"Your move," Matt said, ending his turn. He was starting to get over his fear of Zane. He figured if he won the duel, maybe he would get out of this. Maybe. It was only real chance.

"Let's shake things up. I summon Fabled Grimro(LV4 ATK 1700) to the field. Now I'll sacrifice these two monsters so I can synchro summon my Fabled Valkyrus(LV8 ATK 2900)! Next I'll activate his effect and discard my Archfiend Soldier to destroy your Mauradin Captain. Now Valkyrus, attack Silent Swordsman!" Silent Swordsman was crushed and Matt's life points dropped to 6100. "Your move kid. Try giving me a challenge?"

Matt got mad at that comment, "Don't think you'll win this because you got one lucky move." Matt drew Swords of Revealing Light. "I'll start by using Swords of Revealing Light so you can't attack for 3 turns. Now I can activate The Warrior Returning Alive to return Maurading Captain to my hand. Now I'll summon him(LV3 ATK 1700) and use his effect to summon Queen's Knight(LV4 ATK 1500) and end my turn with that." Matt was stalling at this point. He needed to get something strong onto the field as soon as he could.

"Hmph. You're only delaying the inevitable. I use my Valkyrius's effect to destroy your Captain. Also, since I discarded Fable Lurrie, I can special summon it to the field(LV1 DEF 400). Your move."

Matt drew Pot of Greed. "I activate Pot of Greed to draw 2 more cards," he drew King's Knight and Reinforcement of the Army. "First I'll activate Reinforcement of the Army to add one level 4 or lower Warrior from my deck to my hand. Take Rose Warrior of Revenge for instance. I'll just add it to my hand now, but I'll save that for later. Now, I'll summon King's Knight(LV4 ATK 1600) and because Queen's Knight is already on the field I can special summon Jack's Knight(LV5 ATK 1900). Now, Queen's Knight attack Fabled Lurrie!"

"I activate Threatening Roar which prevents you from attacking me this turn," Zane activated his face down card.

"Damn..." Matt thought to himself. "I end my turn."

"Hmm... I activate my face down card: Ring of Destruction to destroy your Jack's Knight and inflict 1900 life points of damage to both of us," Zane said as his life points dropped to 6100 and Matt's to 4200. "Your move."

Matt drew Divine Sword - Phoenix Blade. "I summon Rose Warrior of Revenge(LV4 ATK 1600). Now I'll sacrifice Rose and Queen's Knight to synchro summon Colossal Fighter(LV8 ATK 2800) and due to my Fighter's effect he gains 100 points for every warrior in my graveyard: my Queen, Jack, Rose, Captain, and Swordsman. 500 points! And that's not all, I'm equipping my Fighter with Divine Sword - Phoenix Blade to raise his attack by 300 more points to a grand total of 3600! Colossal Fighter destroy Fabled Valkyrus," Matt declared as his monster sliced its opponent in half with ease. Zane lost 700 life points and now had 4400. "King's Knight, destroy Fabled Lurrie!" Zane was now defenseless. "Your move."

"Impressive. You put up a much better fight than the others," Zane complimented Matt.

"Others? What others? What are you even doing?" Matt demanded.

"Collecting souls to summon a demon to this plane... I know it sounds crazy but it doesn't really matter, does it? You won't be around to find out whether it's true or not," Zane explained. "Now I'll summon my Fabled Kushano(LV3 DEF 800) to the field and set two cards face down to end my turn. And with that, your Swords of Revealing Light disappear."

Matt drew United We Stand. "I activate United We Stand. By equipping it to my Colossal Fighter he gets an extra 800 attack points for every face-up monster, including himself. So now he's at 4400. Now, attack Fabled Kushano!" The monster was destroyed. "Your move."

"And probably your last. I activate Lightning Vortex which allows me to destroy all of your monsters by discarding one card, such as Goldd, Wu-Lord of Dark World. And because I discarded Goldd due to a card effect he is summoned to the field automatically(LV5 ATK 2300). Next I'll summon my Fabled Urostos(LV4 ATK 1500). I'm going to switch Kushano into attack mode(ATK 1100)."

Matt knew what would happen next and his heart dropped. Would he really lose his soul? Derek mentioned something about people losing duels and falling into comas. What if-

Matt didn't get a chance to finish his thought. His life points hit 0 after the attacks from Fabled Kushano, Urostos, and Goldd, Wu-Lord of Dark World hit. 4900 points of direct damage. More than enough to defeat him. He lost. Everything went black and his body went limp as it fell to the ground.

Zane sighed, "I kind of wish he put up a better fight. He was entertaining... no matter." Zane exited the park leaving Matt's lifeless body on the ground at the entrance to the park.


	2. Trapped in the Light

Author's notes: I think I'm going to change up the duel format a bit. 8000 life points duels take a while to write so I'm going back to 4000. I'm also not going to write what's in the main character's hand because that was also annoying to do sometimes. I'm also including the defense points in my monster stats so now it'll look like this: Dark Magician(LV7 2500/2100)

**Duel 1: Trapped in the Light**

*Bang! Bang! Bang!* Wade was awoken by a loud banging at his front door. Wade's bedroom was near the front of the house on the first floor so he heard the banging as if it were coming from his window.

"Whaaaaat?" Wade groaned. He forced himself out of bed and went to the front door. *Bang! Bang! Bang!* "Yeah... yeah... bang bang and stuff..." he said as he unlocked the door. The banging stopped.

"Did you hear about Matt?" Derek asked.

"Huh?" Wade asked, still half-asleep.

"Dude, school's in half an hour and you're not even up yet? Your parents need to get back from that business trip soon... hurry up and get dressed I needa tell you about what happened last night," Derek said.

"Tell me," Wade answered as he retreated to his room to look for his school uniform.

"Matt didn't get home last night. He was found in a coma after losing a duel..." Derek started.

"What?" Wade asked shocked. "No way... we were... Matt was... What?"

"His mom called me last night and it was on the news this morning. Someone got a video of what happened," Derek explained. "He was dueling some guy in a black cloak and after Matt lost there was some weird static on the video and then Matt was on the ground and the guy was leaving. I'll find the video in class later and show you."

After school Wade, Derek, Kyle, Ariana and Chloe went to the hospital to visit Matt. His mother wasn't there because she had work and his father divorced his mother years ago and no longer lived in the area. Matt was alone.

"Matt..." Kyle said as they looked at his lifeless body.

"How did one guy this just by dueling him?" Chloe asked rhetorically.

"I don't know... but I'm stopping him," Derek said. "We're stopping him. Or her... it could be a her but my point is that this person hurt Matt and we can't let him get away with it!"

"You're right," Ariana agreed.

"How do we find him though?" Chloe pointed out. "Sorry to kill the mood but if we can't find this guy then we're out of luck."

"We'll let him find us," Wade stated simply. "This guy's gotta have a goal, right? We can find him. How hard could it be?"

Harder than they expected. The 5 teens spent the next week before the tournament trying to track down the mystery duelist with no luck. Every night they separated and wandered the darkest parts of the town hoping to get ambushed by the duelist but he seemed to have disappeared completely.

The following Friday, the last day of school before summer vacation the tournament officially started. Like many other large tournaments in the area the first round consisted of a free for all round where a duelist could challenge whoever they wanted to a duel. In order to pass on to the next round they had to collect the required number of whatever trinket the tournament distributed to its competitors(in the previous tournament they were each given 2 unique coins and had to gain 12 over the weekend to pass on to the next round). For this tournament duelists were given diamond-shaped gems that were colored with a mix of green and blue that never quite blended together. They were meant to fit into either a wrist gauntlet or necklace distributed at registration. Duelists needed to gain 7 gems to pass on to the next round.

Kyle was the first find an opponent to duel: Tim Rogers, one of the recent graduates from their high school. He was known for being a basketball star and a great duelist. He was pretty obnoxious though and acted as though he was the best at everything.

"I'll start," Tim said as he drew a card. "I summon Ally of Justice Cyclone Creator(LV3 1400/1200) and place 1 card face down to end my turn."

"First I'll summon Totem Dragon in defense mode(LV2 400/200) and next I'll activate Dragon's Gunfire to inflict 800 points of damage to your life points. And I'll place 1 card facedown to end my turn," Kyle said.

LP: 3200/4000

"Heh, that litle dent in my life points doesn't scare me if that's what you were trying to do. I'll give you something to worry about. I summon Ally Salvo(LV2 400/300) in defense mode. Now, I'll tune my two monsters on the field to Synchro-Summon my Ally of Justice Catastor(LV5 2200/1200)! I'll also activate DNA Transplant so I can change the attribute of every monster on the field to an attribute of my choosing, like Light. Now when Catastor can destroy any monster it battles without appyling battle damage. But we'll save that for later. Now, I'm activating Lightning Vortex. By discarding my Lyna the Light Charmer I can destroy all of your monsters. Now I'll have my Catastor attack you directly and end my turn with that!"

Kyle's Dragon was destroyed by a bolt of lightning, leaving him wide open to the attack of Catastor.

"Yeah... well I've got a few tricks of my own," Kyle said as he drew a card. "First I'll use my Totem Dragon's ability to bring him to the field. Next, I'll use his other effect to treat him as 2 tributes for summon Red-Eyes Black Dragon(LV7 2400/2000)! I'll follow that up with my face-down card: Metalmorph! Now I can summon Red-Eyes Black Metal Dragon(LV8 2800/2400) by sacrificing my regular Red-Eyes! I'll place two cards face down and end my turn."

LP: 3200/1800

Tim drew, "You really don't know when to quit, it isn't like your dragon's gonna be much of a defense once I attack."

"That's why I'm using Threatening Roar so you have to skip your battle phase this turn," Kyle replied.

"Damn. I wanted to finish this duel quick. Oh well, I guess I'll just summon Machina Soldier(LV4 1600/1500) in defense mode and activate Card Trader. Now every standby phase I can take one card in my hand and shuffle it back into my deck then draw a new card. Your move."

"I activate Call of the Haunted to bring my Red-Eyes Black Dragon back to the field. I'll also summon Exploder Dragon(LV2 1000/0)! Hope you're ready for this. First I'll have my Exploder Dragon attack your Catastor! Due to both of our monster's effects no battle damage is done but your monster's destroyed as well. Now I'll have my Red-Eyes Black Dragon attack your Machina Soldier and my Red-Eyes Black Metal Dragon will attack you directly!" Kyle's first dragon flew at Tim's Ally of Justice and blew up, leaving nothing behind. Red-Eyes shot a ball of fire at the other machine and destroyed. Red-Eyes Metal finished things with a long fire blast straight at Tim. "Your move."

LP: 400/1800

Tim had a worried look on his face when he drew his card. "I activate Hammer Shot to destroy your Black Metal Dragon!" A giant hammer slammed down on Red-Eyes Black Metal Dragon leaving nothing behind. "I'll set face down and end my turn."

"Looks like this duel's just about over," Kyle smiled. "I activate another Dragon's Gunfire!" Red-Eyes Black Dragon opened up its mouth and shot a fireball at Tim. "Looks like I win."

LP: 0/1800

"Dammit..." Tim muttered to himself then sighed. "Good game kid." He handed over the gem from his gauntlet.

"Same. Your deck's pretty strong," Kyle replied as he placed his second gem into his gauntlet. Only 5 more left until he made it to the next round.

The two duelists parted way. Kyle bought a soda from a vending machine outside of a store and continued walking until he heard a familiar voice. He followed it around the corner of a building and saw Chloe preparing to duel someone.

"I guess I can take a break for this..." Kyle thought to himself.

_**NEXT:**_ Chloe duels Pete Armstrong, a duelist known for his skills with Dinosaur monsters.


End file.
